William Griswold brought eagerness, energy and a firm, enthusiastic handshake to his first day of work Monday as director of the Cleveland Museum of Art.

"I am so thrilled to be here," he said during a brief chat in the museum's soaring, light-washed atrium, the centerpiece of its recently completed, $320 million expansion and renovation.

"It's extremely exciting, extremely exciting," he added, displaying his tendency to express ebullience by repeating a phrase or two.

Griswold, a veteran, 53-year-old art museum administrator, is in Cleveland after having served six years as director of the Morgan Library & Museum in New York, where he infused fresh energy in a venerable institution following an expansion and renovation designed by architect Renzo Piano.

He previously directed the Minneapolis Institute of Arts and held high-level curatorial posts at the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and the Morgan.

An expert in Renaissance Italian drawings, Griswold has been described by many admirers as a seasoned pro with a full package of skills including art historical expertise and management acumen plus the capacity to enjoy fundraising and the endless meet-and-greet duties required of museum directors.

View full sizeThe Cleveland Museum of Art's atrium is the centerpiece of an expansion designed by Rafael Vinoly, and completed in late 2013. The museum's director, William Griswold, said he loves the expansion and thinks the institution is in great shape. On his first day at work, he said he'd take his time before announcing any personal vision for the museum's future course.Steven Litt, The Plain Dealer

Griswold's new job in Cleveland puts him in a position similar to that of the Morgan as a post-renovation institution.

In Cleveland, with an expansion and renovation designed by architect Rafael Vinoly now finished, Griswold's task is to rev up programs and exhibitions and to prepare for the museum's centennial in 2016, the same year as the Republican National Convention in Cleveland.

Griswold also wants to raise the museum's profile within Northeast Ohio and beyond.

"We still have an unparalleled opportunity to promote this institution locally, regionally, nationally and internationally, and I'm really eager to seize that opportunity," he said.

Griswold's arrival marks a definitive pivot after 10 months of transition that followed the resignation of former director David Franklin in October 2013.

Franklin, the former chief curator and deputy director of the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, left the Cleveland museum abruptly after three years as director after museum trustees presented him with evidence that he had lied to them for 10 months to cover up an affair with an employee who later left the institution and committed suicide.

Franklin's departure contributed to a troubling pattern of high turnover among Cleveland museum directors. Griswold is the museum's fourth director since 2000 – or the fifth, if one counts the interim directorship of Deborah Gribbon in 2009-2010 as a full directorship, which the museum does.

Trustees including Bidwell have expressed the hope that Griswold will stick around for a substantial tenure, a hope the new director addressed in an earlier interview by saying: "I'm staying until I retire or until I get carried out in a box."

On his first day, Griswold said he explored his new museum and met with staff members "where they live, in their offices." He said he was particularly impressed by an early look at the museum's distanced learning center, which produces educational videoconferences for hundreds of schools across the country.

View full sizeA Spencer Finch installation that flooded the atrium of the Morgan Library & Museum with color typified William Griswold's emphasis on contemporary art as director there. Lynn Ischay

Griswold said he also planned to meet on Monday with curators and trustees. The first round of meetings is a prelude, he said, to tours of each gallery with the curators responsible.

"They don't know that yet, but they can read about it in the paper," he said.

The new director is in no hurry to make big decisions.

"It's going to take more time [than a few months] to articulate a personal vision for the museum," he said. "It's not so much a question of holding back as making the right decisions. I need to understand what we've tried, what we're doing now, and where we ought to be headed in the future. It's a process. It's incremental."

Griswold said his first impressions are that the museum "is in wonderful shape and doing wonderful things."

He said he's also aware that arts and political leaders will probably want to discuss a wide range of community issues with him. Among the issues: the need for arts-friendly cultural policies in the city of Cleveland, the potential renewal of Cuyahoga County's cigarette tax for the arts, and the disposition of the artistic estate of industrial designer Viktor Schreckengost, now held in limbo at Cleveland State University.

"I'm generally aware of a lot of these issues and I'm eager to get involved soon – as soon as I'm sufficiently well informed," Griswold said. "I think it's my responsibility to be involved fairly soon – within the next month or so."

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